These scenes few and far between
If you live in Great Britain at the moment, you're not far away from a hosepipe ban. If you live in most of the south east like me, you're already in one and have been in one for quite some time.
This extends from just a hose pipe to all 'non vital' water useage from taps such as cleaning cars and even watering gardens !
So water is a valuable commodity and getting it for your vegetable patch is more difficult than ever before.
But is it that drastic and what can we do ?
A gift from a neighbour moving out
An old giant tea urn from the derelict windmill
The most obvious thing is that when it rains we catch as much of it as we can where we can.
Water butts can be placed just about anywhere; the sides of greenhouses, sheds and outlets from house downpipes.
You can even simply put a sloping board with a bit of guttering along the bottom leading to a butt or any largish container.
This doesn't have to be expensive, you'll find guttering and downpipes plentiful in skips !
Plastic water butts can be obtained from Councils. Some even give them away free.
But, not all vegetables need a lot of water..........
Parsleys and carrots for instance need little water to give you a good crop. Peas and Beans need plenty of water, especially when they are in flower.
Growing early crops of potatoes may be a good idea as main crops in sandy soil may suffer during June.
Spring is the great preparation time and good mulching will get the new sowings going a lot stronger and defensive to weather conditions etc.
When watering, do it in the evening when the sun is getting low and water around the plants, not over them. None will be lost to condensation and it's going direct to the roots.
When planning your vegetable patch, read all the varieties information on each one, some need less water than others.
What we mustn't do is just sit back and moan about who's fault all this is !! It seema that all the moaning in the world isn't going to change much, so we must accept it and get on with it !
Look around your home and garden and see where you can get water from. A chance to be the next Heath Robinson !
One hour of hose sprinkling is the same as a family use in the home in 2 days !
As the climate changes, Droughts hit our garden more each year
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If a household has two people living in it, here’s the weekly toll…
3 baths each per week - 420 lit 2 Showers each - 140 lit Brushing teeth 2 per day - 42 lit
Toilet (ave 8 each per day)- 1008 lit Washing Up (3 per day) - 140 lit
Washing Machine (4 per week) 400 lit Total = 2150 litres per week = 111,800 litres per year !!